


With A Mind Full Of Clouds And Eyes Full Of Tears

by lisachan



Series: Leoverse [112]
Category: Glee
Genre: Angst, M/M, What-If
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-25
Updated: 2017-02-25
Packaged: 2018-09-26 22:03:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9923981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lisachan/pseuds/lisachan
Summary: The phone calls wake him up in the middle of the night.





	

**Author's Note:**

> **WARNING:** This story is a **what if** from the original 'verse. In the canon course of events that, from Leonard Karofsky-Hummel VS The World, led to Broken Heart Syndrome, **this has never happened**.  
>  Now my girlfriend almost hated me for this one, but it was totally worth it.  
> I might explore this what if further in the future, I like the idea that what Leo said might have consequences on the storyline. (Poor Pete, he'll have to bust his ass off to make everything work in the end.)  
> Writen for this week's COW-T #7, Mission 3, prompt: too late.

The phone call wakes him up in the middle of the night.

He doesn't know what time it is, but he knows it must be late. Blaine's sleeping peacefully beside him and there are no noises coming from any part of the house. If the twins are still asleep, then it can't be early enough for them to come crawling on the bed asking to sleep with their dads.

It's late, then. Late and dark. 

Leo will remember the detail as being particularly fitting for the incoming news. For years to come.

He reaches out for his phone and silences the ring tone first, not to wake Blaine up. Then he turns it to look at the screen, and something shifts in his brain upon seeing the name of the caller.

He doesn't even remember ever registering Vince's number on his phone. He tries to come up for a few reasons explaining why would his phone even recognize Vince's phone number, especially considering he's pretty sure Vince and him have never spoken a word over the phone. Then he remembers – it was that time Blaine offered them a month in the Hamptons' house. It was for Cody's birthday, but at the last moment Cody's phone had exploded because Alex had put it in the microwave and... he doesn't remember how exactly that ended up causing him and Vince to exchange phone numbers, but that's more or less how it happened.

It's been almost eleven years ago, and Vince has never called him on the phone in the timeframe going from that day to this one.

The idea upsets him.

The phone stops vibrating in his hand, and for a moment Leo wonders if he should leave it at that. Perhaps Vince dialed his number by mistake. It's too freaking late to be an intentional call, after all. But then Leo frown, realizing the lack of logic in his own reasoning: it's definitely too late _not_ to be an intentional call. Vince should be sleeping, not calling him. If he called him, he must've wanted to do it.

He's about to call him back, when the phone starts ringing again. This time he's fast. He doesn't even need to silence it not to disturb Blaine. He answers right away.

“Vince?” he asks, “Is everything okay?”

But the fact that he's already crying makes clear it isn't.

“Leo,” he says. Leo's not sure to have ever heard him like this. Vince is the very picture of strength. Strongly built, tan, with a deep baritone voice and his beard, always finely trimmed but full and pitch black, he seems designed to project on the others a feeling of unshakeable stability and firmness.

And his voice is shaking so much it reminds Leo of a crystal chandelier caught in a tornado. 

“Vince,” he says. Just his name. He can't find it in himself to say anything else because such a voice can only mean one thing, and he's not sure his brain can process that.

“You have to come,” Vince sobs. He _sobs_. Leo's never heard him sob. He didn't even know Vince could produce such a sound. “It's bad. He— He's had an accident.”

“Who's—” he almost chokes on his own breath, “Who's had an accident, Vince?”

He doesn't answer, his voice _erupts_ from the bottom of his throat. Heavy with pain, and fear, and anxiety. True desperation. 

“Cody,” he says, and Leo's eyesight goes dark. “You have to come here right now,” Vince goes on, “It's bad. They say— Shit,” he just starts crying, unable to say anything else. Not that Leo needs him to. Not that he would've heard anything else, anyway. Not after hearing Cody's name.

He pulls the phone away from his ear. He hears Vince's voice calling his name a few more times – Leo? Leo?, growing distant in the night – then he interrupts the phone call and looks at the phone screen again. It flickers, then its light grows dim. Then it turns off completely. 

He puts it down. Not back on the nightstand, but under the pillow, as if burying it there could make it disappear, and as if making it disappear could erase the echo of Vince's words from his mind – or from reality. He lies on his back, staring at the ceiling. He can't really see it, but he feels it there, up above, something familiar, something he's used to. 

Then it happens. It's sudden and painful, and he can do nothing but be overwhelmed by it. It's Cody's face. The first time he saw him – that little broken thing sitting alone in the corner of the room at Adam's frat house's party, wearing clothes too big for him, perfect to hide him from the world, but not from his eyes. The half worried, half annoyed expression dancing on his face when Leo followed him out the back that night. How hard it was to make him give in for the promise of a date. The way he looked after their first kiss, all puffy lips and watery eyes. The million pictures of them having sex Leo holds safe in his mind and chest, the way his back arched whenever Leo touched a sensitive spot, the way his cheeks flushed when Leo held him tight, the way his lips used to part in an unconscious smile only seconds before an orgasm. 

And then his eyes when Leo broke up with him once Blaine came back into his life. How hard it was to see him go. How painful it was to watch him smile and say he understood – while there was a part of Leo's heart, Leo never knew how big, hoping he would get angry, hoping he would say no, I will never let you go, hoping Cody would cling to him for dear life because even then, as he was about to tell him goodbye, all he really wanted was to hold him close to his chest and kiss him at the top of his head, whispering sweet nothings to him as if nothing had happened at all.

His smile when they finally reconnected years later, after Blaine and him got married. The first glimpse Leo caught of his pale, smooth skin when he first came visiting them in Lima, bringing along a husband and a baby son so very similar to him Leo remembers holding him for hours, wondering if he could keep him.

All the times he's heard his voice over the phone and wished to have him by his side.

All the times they've looked at each other above the table during lunch or dinner, while Leo tried to hold back from the intense desire he had to reach out for him, touch him, even just with the tip of his foot, to let him know he _wanted_ to.

All the times he's wanted to kiss him despite the husbands and kids keeping them apart.

All the times he's thought of him even just to fill up a hole in his chest.

All the hours he's spent trying to turn the very concept of him, the idea of him, into a fictional character to insert in his books. And all the times he's had to start from scratches because no character seemed to be well thought of enough to represent what Cody meant for him.

The opportunity he had been. The chance for rebirth he had represented. The pain he had turned into when they lost touch. The joy his presence has always been able to add to his life, just because he existed somewhere in the world, and Leo knew he was the only thing he could always call _mine_ without ever wondering if Cody felt differently or if he felt the same.

The open wound and the healing wish he's always been – he still is. 

He breaks into a sob. It feels like his whole body's gonna shatter, but it doesn't. He clutches his fingers around the sheets too see if they're gonna fall off under enough strain, but they don't. Firmly in place. The human body is unbreakable.

Except for Cody's, apparently.

He reaches out for Blaine, turning to look at him. He's still sobbing but he's not sure if he's crying. He can't feel the tears. He can't feel anything. Except sheer terror.

“Blaine,” he howls in the silent darkness of their bedroom, “Blaine.”

His husband's body reacts to his touch and his voice as it's always done. He stirs on the bed and turns to face him. Soon enough, he's opening his eyes. Leo can see their golden brown light up with the blue light of the mood. He looks so calm for a moment Leo's tempted to ask him how can he be so serene when the sky is falling and the earth is cracking everywhere. Then he remembers he's got a partial vision of this. The sky is falling and the earth is cracking, yes, but Blaine doesn't know that yet.

He instantly notices his tears, though, and he props himself up, moving closer to him. “Leo...?” he calls for him, wrapping his arms around his husband's body on sheer instinct, “Baby, what's going on? Do you feel sick?”

“Yes,” Leo spits out, before he even thinks about it. After all, it's true. He feels sick. So sick he could throw up.

“Baby, I'm sorry,” Blaine says. His voice is sweet and soothing, and there's a light smile on his face that shows exactly how far he is from understanding the situation in its entirety. 

But that's on Leo. Blaine doesn't know. He has to tell him.

“Something's happened to Cody,” he says, and silence falls heavily upon the room. Then his own voice starts ringing in his ears. Something's happened to Cody. Something's _happened_ to _Cody_. “Something's happened...” he turns between Blaine's arms, grabs them hard, clutching his fingers around his wrists, trying at the same to break free from his hold and to drag him together with himself with every move he makes, “Cody... Vince called!”

“Leo, what are you talking about?” Blaine tries to keep him anchored to reality by holding him tightly, but there's something awakening in his voice too, some sort of vague knowledge that his husband wouldn't be making such a fuss if it wasn't something serious, already awakening in his mind despite the fact that he was fast asleep up to a few minutes ago. 

Leo doesn't know how to answer that question, anyway. What _is_ he talking about? He doesn't know. He hasn't asked for any detail over the phone. They seemed irrelevant. He knew enough already, and he tries to tell that to Blaine. He explains Vince called him. That he told him there's been an accident. That he didn't say what kind of accident, but that he said Leo had to go there – there where? – soon because they – they who? – said – said what? – and he's already crying again, and he stood up from the bed as he spoke, and he hasn't even noticed.

Blaine stands up too.

“My God,” he says, “My God,” his voice is shaking.

He tries asking a few practical questions. Leo can't hear them. It's not that he doesn't listen, it's that his body's blocking out every sound. He can only listen to the roaring thunder of his own blood as it rushes through his vein and rumbles in his ears, covering everything else up.

“We have to—” he wheezes, “We have to get there before it's too late.”

“Baby, there _where_ ,” Blaine asks desperately, “There _where_?”

Leo doesn't know. He didn't ask Vince. He was so stupid. He didn't ask Vince.

“My phone,” he says, “Vince.”

He wonders if Blaine can understand his private lingo, right now. If the few bitten out words he's actually able to spit out will be enough to let the message through. 

Blaine nods. Thanks God he exists.

“Where?” he asks.

Leo simply says, “Pillow.”

Blaine nods again and Leo watches him launch himself across the room, back to the bed. His pillow's flying against the wall a second later. There his phone is. Ringing. 

Blaine grabs it, answers so fast he almost slams it against his own teeth.

Vince's talking and crying so loud Leo can hear it despite the distance between himself and Blaine, and the fact that the phone's so pressed against Blaine's cheek it looks like he's getting ready to swallow it. “I didn't tell Leo—” he says, and Blaine interrupts him right away, “Yes, yes,” he almost barks, “Tell me, where do we have to come?”

He must be telling Blaine the name of the hospital and the address, Leo imagines, because Blaine’s listening to him with devoted attention, his eyes wide, his head nodding every now and then. “Yes,” he says after a while, “I got it. We’ll see you there.” Then he pauses for a moment and raises his voice, “As soon as possible, Vince, as soon as possible! We need to tell Timmy!” And then he stops talking right away, and as awareness rises inside his mind like the sun at dawn, lighting up the world, the very same notion makes its way into Leo’s crowded mind too.

They have to tell Timmy. Because Alex is going to be there at the hospital. He’s going to be there because – oh, God – because his father – good God – he’s going to be there and he’s going to need Timmy by his side.

“The kids…” Leo says in half a panic. He can’t think about leaving the twins alone in the house for God knows how many hours. He had taken for granted they’d ask Timmy to take care of them in their absence – isn’t that what they always do? – but now he understands they can’t, because Timmy’s gonna want to come along, and they’ll have to find another way, they’ll simply _have_ to, because he needs to go, he needs to see Cody and he just knows, he _knows_ if circumstances force him to, he’s gonna ask Blaine to stay behind. No matter how bad that would be. No matter how wrong it’d be of him to ask. He can’t even _think_ about the possibility of not being there, now, by Cody’s side. So if they don’t find a different way, Blaine’s gonna have to stay behind, and Leo will leave him behind guiltlessly. “Blaine,” he says, his voice shaking, “The kids.”

“I’ll find a way,” Blaine throws his phone away and walks back towards him, holding him by his shoulders as if he was scared he might start floating up in the air and away, as if he wanted to keep him in place by using himself as dead weight. “I’ll fix it. Get dressed. I’ll take care of everything.”

Leo nods quickly because he likes the idea. He wants Blaine to fix this. He wants him to fix everything, from Timmy to the kids to the car to the ride. So he won’t have to think about it. So he can concentrate on trying not to fall apart.

He watches everything as it happens as though he was looking inside a house that wasn’t his own through a window from the street. He puts some clothes on, the first few things he can get his hands upon, an old pair of jeans and a hoodie, some old All Stars he hasn’t worn since he was twenty or something, and then just watches. Enjoys the sight of Blaine handling everything around him as if he was the master of the universe and all he needed to do was to create order through utter chaos.

He wakes Timmy up and breaks the news to him. Somehow he manages to do that without crying. He doesn’t even cry when Timmy starts to – Leo knows he wouldn’t have been able to do it. He’s never able to pull off these things. 

He doesn’t wait for Timmy to ask to be brought along, he tells him to get dressed while he finds a place for the twins. Then he calls Marge and Rodney, living next door, and tells them they need their help for the night. He explains them the situation in as many details as he can without either wasting time or tell them too much, and they accept to take the kids in despite the late hour and the fact that they have virtually no obligation to do such a thing. They’re Timmy’s grandparents, right, but there’s nothing binding them to the twins, and yet they do it, because they’re good people, that’s what they are. They’re good people who lost their precious daughter – and that’s what life does to good people, it takes good things from them.

Now life’s taking Cody from him. And though he’s not a good person, life’s also taking itself from Cody, and Cody’s the best person Leo’s ever met. So of course life had to steal something from him – everything, apparently.

He doesn’t know when exactly he has started crying again, but Blaine finds him like that when he finally comes back from the house next door, his arms free of kids and bags.

“Leo, what are you _doing_ standing still like that?” he says, holding him by his shoulders and shaking him a little, “Get in the car!”

Leo’s thankful for the order, and obeys it immediately.

*

When they arrive, Vince’s sitting in the waiting room and, upon seeing him, Leo’s overcome by a sense of irrational anger he can’t explain. How can he sit still like that? He should be crawling up the walls with anxiety. He should be pacing the room hard and fast enough to leave scars on the tiled floor, like Alex was doing when they walked in. That he could just sit there passively, waiting for something to happen, is so completely unacceptable that Leo finds himself thinking very clearly, he doesn’t deserve Cody. He doesn’t deserve him. He’s not suffering nearly as much as he should. He doesn’t deserve to have him and call him his own.

He doesn’t voice any of these thoughts, but they’re there, and they’re screaming in his head, pushing him to act irresponsibly.

Alex flies between Timmy’s arms the moment he sees him. Blaine calls for Vince and Vince stands up, walking towards him. Both his husband and his son are asking for news, but Leo barely registers those actions. Asking’s not enough for him. He needs to know – he needs to see. He heads straight for a nurse when he sees her come out of Surgery.

“Excuse me,” he says, “I need to see Cody.”

It doesn’t occur to him that his words might be making no sense anywhere outside of his mind. He doesn’t notice the heavy silence falling upon Blaine and Vince when they hear them. He doesn’t mind the nurse’s perplexed expression as she studies him, trying to understand who might he be. 

He does, though, notice the quick confused glance she exchanges with Vince.

And that infuriates him.

“I’m talking to you,” he tells her, grabbing her face between his thumb and index finger and making her turns back towards himself.

The nurse actually screams – she didn’t expect him to touch her. And Blaine reads the situation in an instant and throws himself at him, grabbing him and forcing him to move a couple steps back. “Calm down, baby,” he says soothingly, but Leo’s beyond himself with fear and anger, and he frees himself bucking like a horse.

“I need to see him!” he yells. He’s smart enough not to move towards the nurse again, at least. She seems terrified, but she’s also been taught well not to surrender to her fears, and so she stands her ground, watching him carefully, despite the horror of having been touched like that. 

“Sir,” she tries reasonably, “Mr. Petersen is in serious conditions, and the doctors haven’t allowed any visits yet.”

“I don’t give a flying fuck what the doctors allowed!”

“Sir, lower your voice!” she says, outraged by his behavior. She’s young, she must be in her mid-twenties. She can’t have seen that many people acting like this, except for him. And Leo’s sure she’s never witnessed a pain like his own. She can’t— no one in the world can, because – he doesn’t care how self-entitled that sounds – no one has ever suffered like he’s suffering now, before. No one’s ever felt such a sharp, corrosive pain. No one’s ever wanted to see a face for one last time like he longs for it now.

“I need to get into that room,” he says in a low growl, “I have to. If you don’t let me in, I’ll fucking kick down the door.”

“You have to calm down!” she says. She’s giving in to shock, Leo can see it in her eyes. Control’s slipping out of her. When someone’s completely unhinged, there’s only so much someone else can take of it before they lose it too. She turns her eyes on Blaine and Vince, searching for their help, but they look back at her, completely at a loss. Leo knows none of them can make sense of what’s happening right now. And he can only imagine the way Timmy and Alex must be looking at him from the other side of the room.

He doesn’t care.

He tries to move another step in the direction of the door, but Blaine tackles him and stops him. “Leo,” he says, dropping the endearing nicknames, “Please, calm down.”

“No!” he frees himself once more and turns to face him, “Look me in the fucking eyes, Blaine, do you think I’m going to calm down?!”

Blaine actually steps back, and Leo hates to behave like this with him. He _hates_ it. But his brain is piling up priorities differently than it usually would if Cody wasn’t lying on a fucking hospital bed, ready to leave for good, and he wasn’t risking to be too late to see him for one last time.

He turns back towards the nurse. He tries to be as reasonable as he possibly can, which right now translates into using as less words as his language lets him to get the message across without letting his fiery rage pass through too.

“Let me in,” he simply says.

The nurse is almost shaking. She turns towards Vince, then towards Blaine. “But not even family’s been allowed in, yet…” she tries weakly.

Blaine swallows and intercedes for him. “Please, let him in. I know it’s not standard procedure, but he really needs to see him.”

“But— who the hell are you?!” the nurse finally loses it, turning to look at him.

“I’m his boyfriend!” Leo roars, throwing his arms up, “Let me the fuck in!”

He doesn’t have time to reflect about the consequences of what he just said. He senses a coldness fall upon the room, followed by the hot fiery tongue of rage, and he knows these words are something he’s going to be held accountable for, just not now. The nurse looks at Vince with empty eyes, silently asking him, if he’s the boyfriend and you’re the husband, who’s lying?

Leo would like to tell her no one. No one’s lying. He might’ve married him, but he’s still mine. He’s always gonna be mine that way. Until he slips away.

She gives up. She gives up trying to make sense of this, and it’s the first thing Leo can be grateful to her for. She whispers a weak “come this way” and he follows her silently, passing through the door and walking the white hallway leading to Intensive Care with a mind full of clouds, and eyes full of tears.

He feels exhausted. He feels dreadful. He needs to see Cody and at the same time he wants this walk to never end, so that he never has to really _see_ him, he never has to really acknowledge the fact that he might—

“He’s here,” the nurse says, forcing him out of it.

She opens the door and Cody’s lying on the bed on the other side. He’s covered in bruises. His legs are both plastered and one of his arms too. There are bandages everywhere, one of which wrapped firmly around half of his face. He’s got his eyes closed and tubes and threads coming out from his nose and veins.

He looks like a broken angel. Exactly how an angel would look like, yes, if it fell from heaven and crashed to the ground. 

“What happened to him?” he manages to ask with a whisper of a voice.

“He was hit by a pickup truck on his way home.”

“But it’s three in the morning. Where was he—”

“The accident happened just before dinnertime,” she explains, “Surgery went on for hours.”

Leo swallows, turning to look at her. It takes him forever to unglue his eyes for Cody’s still figure.

“So it’s that bad, huh?” he asks. He’s crying again – will he ever stop?

A spark of what he’s feeling, a trickle, an echo of it must be passing from him to her, because he sees her eyes pool with tears too. She doesn’t cry, but her voice is shaking. “I’m sorry,” she says. Then she covers her mouth with a hand to suppress a sob and turns away, running out of the room.

He turns back towards Cody, and there’s nothing to do now except moving closer to him. (Has he ever really had another choice? Whenever Cody walked into a room, was he ever really able to do anything but gravitate towards him?)

“Sweetness,” he says. He sits down on the edge of the bed and tries stroking his cheek. He wonders if he’s gonna hurt him. He decides Cody’s gonna have to suffer through it, if that’s the case, because he simply cannot go another second without touching him. And so he does, and he feels he’s cold as ice under his fingertips, and that forces a desperate sob out of him. 

“Fuck… sweetness,” he calls him again, stroking his cheek lovingly, “Shit. You’re…” but he stops before finishing the sentence. He was about to tell him he was cold, but seriously, if there’s a single part of him that’s still aware Leo doesn’t wanna bore him by telling him things he already knows. “…you’re so fucking beautiful,” he says instead, “Even like this. Christ, I look at you and you’re too beautiful for words.” 

He sobs again, tears falling freely down his cheeks. God, he cannot even think about living without him. Blaine gives his life purpose but the idea that Cody might not be there tomorrow when he wakes up breaks him into a million pieces. 

“Cody, please,” he leans in, bending over him. He rests his forehead against the softness of Cody’s tummy, presses his face against it through the blankets and cries so hard to leave wet marks on the fabric. “Please, don’t leave me. Fuck—” he sobs, he wheezes, he feels like he’s suffocating, he feels like he’s falling off the face of the Earth, “Fuck, shit, baby, I love you, please, don’t leave me.”

“You’re hurting me.”

His voice is so weak Leo almost misses it. It seems like someone speaking from a million miles away, from another planet, from another world.

But he’s here, and he’s talking.

And he’s alive.

He looks up and Cody’s there, looking at him. The tubes coming out of his nose make him look like a little alien, and his only open eye is so big Leo can see all of himself, of themselves, of their history reflected into it. 

“Oh God,” he says with a broken voice. He moves up along the bed and resists the urge to hug him, but he leans into him desperately, enveloping him in his arms, “Oh God, baby, you’re alive. Shit, you woke up.”

“What,” Cody says, “I wasn’t supposed to…?”

Leo breaks a laughter between his lips and presses a desperate kiss against his forehead. “Don’t even joke like this, don’t even—” he sobs again, his shoulders shaking, tears streaming down his face and falling on Cody’s cheeks like raindrops. “Jesus, you got me so scared, baby boy. So fucking scared. Don’t ever— I have to call the nurse.”

“Yes,” Cody whispers, and moves his free hand to wrap it around the fabric of Leo’s hoodie, keeping him still. His hold is weak and still it’s the strongest force Leo’s ever felt applied to himself. “In a moment, tho.” He breathes in and out, closing his eye for a second before looking back at him. “Can you please say it again?” he asks, “Before… before everyone else comes rushing in. Can you please say it again?”

It takes Leo a moment to realize what Cody means, and when he finally does his heart jumps in his throat, cutting his breath.

Will he be held responsible for this too?, he wonders distractedly.

Then he decides he doesn’t care about that either.

“I love you,” he says.

He feels all three words slip down along his tongue, and they taste sweet. He doesn’t regret one of them.


End file.
